Suicide bombings not such a great idea after all

Of the 16 majority Muslim countries included in the survey, 15 have shown waning enthusiasm for terrorism in general and suicide terrorism in particular, it says.

The most striking declines are in Lebanon, where in 2007 34 per cent of people say suicide bombings are justified compared with 74 per cent in 2002. There has been a similar decline in Pakistan from 33 per cent to 9 per cent and in Jordan from 43 to 23 per cent. Only among Palestinians, where 70 per cent say suicide attacks are sometimes or often justified, do a majority continue to support it.

I still don’t understand why suicide attacks should engender stronger condemnation than plain vanilla non-suicidal terrorism. Doesn’t the former have the advantage of at least one less player on the other team? Or is that just the case from my perspective?